I’m no Heyward hater, at least other than the fact that as a Mets fan, it’s hard to like the Braves. I can certainly appreciate his talent, and he hasn’t had a chance yet to take Atlanta’s Mets Killer torch from Chipper. At the start of the season, I was among those who figured the NL ROY was his to lose, but even that phrasing isn’t fair to him. He had some injuries that supressed his numbers a bit, and in the end even the fact that he was in the lineup from Opening Day couldn’t keep him from fending off Posey. The Giants catcher put up numbers just as good or better than Heyward in a lot of the key categories and did a fine job handling a top-of-the-line pitching staff in a tight pennant race, right down to the final day of the season. Just as Alex Rodriguez‘s defense ostensibly pushed him over the top against David Ortiz for the AL MVP a few years back, I think Posey’s defense played a part in this award. Good for him, even if he is a Seminole.